A brand new XUP board is sitting on my desk

A brand new XUP board is sitting on my desk

... and even better it doesnt have the old jtag programmer onboard so it works with GRMON! So much better than the serial debug system I was using before. It programs about 10 times faster for a start.

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A few things that made my 2015 interesting

A few things that made my 2015 interesting

The beautiful view from the Mayan Palace, Mexico

2015 was a wonderful and probably the best-so-far year for me. This year had traces of a few previous years, remarkably 2013.

Abiding to my tradition of writing an annual summarizing post, I am listing below a few things that made my 2015 interesting. The list is in a random order, and the order does not represent anything.

1. Data Quality (QD) module. 

ok, I never thought I will start this list with a course I did at the university. But there are multiple reasons.

2. A leisurely sun set walk in Puerto Pe�asco, Mexico. 

3. Graduating. Twice!

This year, I graduated from my masters double degree, from IST Lisboa and KTH Stockholm, and attended two graduation ceremonies (in Portugal and Sweden) to receive the degree award.

4. My comeback to FOSS.

It was always in my new year resolutions in the recent years. This year I got active with OpenDaylight community, leading the Messaging4Transport Project, and also created an OpenDaylight user group in Lisboa.

5. The HOT Summer! More beaches, across continents - in Portugal, Spain, Mexico, Sri Lanka, Maldives, Sweden, Italy, and Croatia. Portim�o beach in Portugal was unexpectedly pleasant.

6. Floating in the water with fish, in the clean water beach of an uninhabited island of Maldives.

7. Chocolate wine! Who dislikes them?

8. OpenDaylight Summit in Santa Clara. I never thought I will have this much of information from a single conference. This was my second time to SJC, and first time to encounter a delayed flight and changing the flights to avoid missing the connecting flight.

9. God Ganesh Temple and getting soaked in the rainy night in Colombo.

10. Cooking for my parents in Sri Lanka.

I have cooked for friends many times before. But first time for my mom and dad. That was truly remarkable. I missed this during my 2013 visit (and I was not capable of cooking before 2013. :) )

11. A long walk in a burning day in Belgrade. Till that point, I was under the impression that nothing can burn me.

12. Ljubljana. I was impressed by the river side wifi and game meat. :)

13. A number of travels, higher than the last three years combined!

14. Backpacking to Andorra. Never thought I would be able to go light weight. An achievement of the year for sure. 

15. A helicopter ride in a pleasant winter day.

16. More presentations! First time I presented my work in another university as a guest speaker.

My presentation at ASU, in Tempe for IC2E 2015 was remarkable. Loved that conference, and active involvement and enthusiasm from the participants during many of the presentations.

17. A late summer vacation in Sri Lanka. Not really a vacation. I was getting married. ^_^

Also experienced being a tourist in Colombo. Never felt like a tourist in my own country before.

18. My first short-term scientific mission (STSM) at the University of Rijeka, Croatia. Sounds fancy, isnt it? :)

This also includes working with my computer with the noise of frogs, while sitting outside the University of Rijeka in the stair case, in the mid night! They just close the faculty by 10 pm, and I did not have internet connection in my big and beautiful apartment (that was supposed to be a professors apartment. The topmost floor of the students dormitory. Loved it).

All the COST actions of the same program are listed here, including mine.

19. Long flights. This year I had many long flights.

I enjoy watching movies in the long flights, because they have English subtitles for foreign language movies. Sometimes I just fall asleep in the flight while attempting to watch a movie. :D

This year, for the first time, I got my luggage delayed (by a day, and it was in PHX). Another first - this year, when I reached SJC after completing a trip, I was informed that there is a flight delay that might lead me missing my connecting flight in LAX. Hence, I was given a free shuttle ride to SFO and sent to LIS in an alternative route. :)

20. Stockholm, once again! It was loads of loads of loads of memories! I actually went to Stockholm twice this year. But somehow missed Kista during both trips.

21. Kayaking once more from Fejan! Never did I guess in 2013 that I would visit this place for another EMDC Summer Event.

22. An unhealthy lunch at Trst, Italy. All while keeping an eye at the hungry, persistent, and bullying seagulls.

23. Planning for the events in 2016 starting from early December!

Already have 3 confirmed events in my list in Berlin, Portland, and San Francisco.In addition, have a planned trip to Shenzhen, and planning another long term journey to Atlanta. Many of these events are outcomes of the collaboration with Emory BMI. It was a pleasant surprise that we got many papers as outcomes, which I am in fact going to present in 2016. We have 4 accepted papers; 3 to be presented - MediCurator, Data Cafe, and SPREAD, and MEDIator already presented.

24. Barcelona once more. This was my first EMJD-DC Spring Event. Nice to meet all the colleagues for the first. We are so distributed - In Portugal, Spain, Belgium, and Sweden.

25. Renting an own apartment. No more apartment sharing, at least as long as we are in Portugal. More privacy.. ^_^

26. Random walking in many new cities alone. Often with a map. Often without; asking strangers for information. It felt like a virtual reality game, finding random places with no knowledge of the local language.  May be an increased level of confidence? Well, to be fair, many of the youngsters I met in these cities speak better English than me.

27. Some successes (xSDN, ?u?u, Cassowary, MEDIator, Data Cafe, MediCurator, SPREAD, ..) and some failures (SDCO, S�DN, RAVANA, SMART, FIRM, ..), and... some mixtures (SENDIM, ..). I am talking about my projects, if you are confused.

28. Spring flowers in Frankfurt, Germany.

29. International border crossings by land, and long bus rides. 

This includes US <-> Mexico, Croatia <-> Slovenia, and Croatia <-> Serbia. Never really did this before this year (not counting Sweden <-> Denmark (2013) and Spain <-> Andorra (2015) as real borders due to the Schengen open visa policy).

30. Multiple plots and locations. Spent most of the time in Portugal, with one month each in Croatia and Sri Lanka, in the mid-year.

Other short-term locations include US (twice), Mexico, Germany, Sweden (twice), Spain, Andorra, Italy, Slovenia, Serbia, and Maldives. This made 2015 a year full of travels for me.

Thanks for reading my list till the end. If you are really interested, you may also read the blog posts on the previous years (2015 - 2012) as well.

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5 Times JRPGs Kicked My Ass

5 Times JRPGs Kicked My Ass

As much as I love video games, I don�t claim to be the best at gaming. While I can pick up most mechanics, my varying degree of skill with some games has made me no stranger to the Game Over screen and Ive had to hit the Retry button in some of my most played games (such as my complete inability to complete the Omega Ruins in Final Fantasy X). Recently I�ve been playing the Roguelike JRPG Sorcery Saga: The Curse of the Great Curry God, a fun but tough dungeon crawler that has found me sent back to its town without my items on multiple occasions with a small bit of my dungeon confidence eaten away. This made me think back to some of the many fails I�ve had while playing JRPGs and while these are only a small selection, these are some of the biggest fails I�ve had while playing or more accurately, times I�ve had my ass kicked while playing JRPGs.

Note: I�ve kept spoilers to a minimum by mostly not mentioning boss names and story circumstances, but there are some minor spoilers about significant boss battles in this article. Proceed with caution!

Final Fantasy X�s Final Boss

If there�s one thing Final Fantasy is good at, it�s bosses with multiple forms or stages. I�m not referring to the final boss battle that you pretty much automatically win, I�m talking about the true final boss of Final Fantasy X, the one with more than one stage and an overdrive gauge that can quickly wipe out any unprepared party. There are a bunch of bosses like this in Final Fantasy X but when I played the HD Remaster a couple of years ago, I was reminded of that feeling of total horror when you think youve won the boss battle, but oh no, lets put multiple status ailments on all your characters, shatter a couple for good measure and knock some out because Im definitely out of Phoenix Downs. It was horrible, but the satisfaction I got after grinding a little more, taking advance of any possible status vulnerabilities, winning and crying like a baby to the ending was definitely worth the struggle.

You can pick up Final Fantasy X HD Remaster from Play-Asia.com*!

Persona 3 FES�s Final Boss

Persona 3�s boss battle is one of the absolute harshest boss battles I have ever experienced. If Final Fantasy X was bad for bosses with multiple forms, Persona 3�s boss is just plain unreasonable. When I played Persona 3 this year, I assumed that it would be harder than the previous bosses I�d faced, all of which had been difficult but not impossible, but the absolute uphill struggle I faced was definitely beyond my expectations. The final boss really ramps up the difficulty, with over 10 different forms to fight and without a proper strategy, any party will be quickly annihilated. I can�t even begin to tell you how many online guides I read and Youtube videos I watched just to check if winning was a possibility and to work out how to defeat that thing with what I had. I must have tried it over 20 times and definitely saw a lot of Game Over screens, which are just a little more crushing when youre almost at the end of the game. It took a lot of persistence and a little grinding, but eventually I did it. I hope to never face a boss that slays me that hard again.

You can pick up the original Persona 3 FES for PS2 from Play-Asia.com* or pick up the PS2 Classic from the Playstation Network Store!

Final Fantasy IX�s Plant Brain

I think I had a lot of luck when I versed Final Fantasy IX�s Plant Brain for the first time, because I had no problem beating it. However something happened - either my Vita ran out of power or I turned it off without saving - and somehow, I lost my save, meaning I had to do the boss battle again. Fine, I said. Piece of cake, right? Wrong.

Older JRPGs are different to the standard beginning of a modern JRPG. They don�t try to make you feel like a god in the first few battles so that you keep playing. They�re not scared to kick you around and knock out a majority of your party, which is exactly what happened to me. I wasn�t expecting to use any healing items because it was one of the first boss fights in the game and I repeatedly kept getting knocked down and finding myself at the Game Over screen thinking I was a better gamer than this. Going from winning on my first try to absolutely struggling was kind of a shock, but I accepted it was going to be a tough battle, put my pride aside and healed my party. It did however let me understand that Final Fantasy IX was going to be a little more challenging than other Final Fantasy�s I played, so it served as a good introduction for what was ahead.

You can pick up the original Final Fantasy IX for PS One from Play-Asia.com* or pick up the PS One Classic from the Playstation Network Store!

Sorcery Saga: the Curse of the Great Curry God�s Chapter 4 Dungeon

Ah, my week long dilemma. Every dungeon in Sorcery Saga is a little punishing, but with the amount of potential enemies that can surround you, surprisingly strong bosses and devastating traps in the 25 floors of this fourth dungeon, Sorcery Saga is definitely working against me in my quest to win this dungeon. Since Sorcery Saga is a Roguelike JRPG, I�m also starting fresh each dungeon run so if I lose, my next run is even tougher because I may not have my best sword anymore. And even if I go in with the best equipment in the world, there�s potential for it to get cursed or eaten by an enemy or Kuu (your friendly dungeon pet) if hes super hungry. It seems like I need a lucky run and to use Kuu and the area as perfectly as possible. For now, my dungeon crawling confidence is waning, but I will not give up!

(Fun fact: before this article went up, I won the dungeon through excessive grinding on each floor and risking dungeon collapse. Yay! Currently slowly going through the last dungeon so I dont you know...die.)

You can pick up Sorcery Saga: the Curse of the Great Curry God from Play-Asia.com*!

Persona 4 Golden�s �Legend of Inaba - Max Out All Social Links� Trophy

I�ve spoken mostly about getting my ass kicked in battle in this article, but there are plenty of ways JRPGs can make things hard for the player, such as the simultaneously heartwarming and patience-testing Legend of Inaba trophy from Persona 4 Golden. Social Links are an enjoyable part of Persona 4 Golden, but to max them all out in one playthrough requires thorough planning and execution, something I failed at multiple times. This trophy pretty much took me three playthroughs, and with a playthrough of Persona 4 Golden being over 100 hours on average, I don�t need to tell you it was hard work. I had to make sure I said the right things to each character or else I may not be able to fully get them to the next Social Link rank in the next interaction, which would cost more time. Memorising what days characters were available, on top of keeping the dungeon crawling part of the game afloat was a true challenge, but at least it was a fulfilling one as its probably the most immersed Ive felt in a story. Persona 4�s well-written characters thankfully made this worth it and I�m forever happy about the 300+ hours I spent with Persona 4 Golden, even if it was tough.

You can pick up Persona 4 Golden from Play-Asia.com*!

Some JRPGs might be ruthless difficulty-wise, but I never think it�s a bad thing. It�s the persistent battling and desire to beat challenges that make completing a JRPG so rewarding, like I truly worked for the experience I gained. I honestly think sometimes the persistence I�ve had encouraged in JRPGs has also become apart of my everyday life, as I look to be challenged in real life situations and in a weird way I enjoy the struggling challenges presented to me in JRPGs as working them out feels truly satisfying. Knowing that all the challenges in JRPGs are conquerable keeps me going and I�m looking forward to whatever the next JRPG struggle I face is, even if its a temporary kick to my confidence as a player. In the end, its worth it.

_______________________________________________________________________________

Have you had a memorable JRPG ass-kicking? What was your biggest JRPG challenge?

Leave a comment below, send me a tweet at @JRPGJungle, hit me up on Facebook or Instagram and lets talk!

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A few things that made my 2016 interesting

A few things that made my 2016 interesting

2016 was a different year compared to the previous. It had a large share of sad moments. This post discusses only the happy moments and the memories that make my 2016 interesting. The order is random and does not indicate the order of significance or importance.

1. A year-end vacation after a long time.
Winter in 3 countries - Switzerland, Austria, and Liechtenstein!

2. New Years eve in Zurich. 
Eating all the street food and high calories! It was also my first time outside Lisboa for the new years eve, since 2012.

3. Playing with snow in Malbun, Liechtenstein. 
It is after more than 3 years!

4. Summer in the Bahamas.
That was a long weekend in Nassau. Blue beaches - private and public ones. Reminding Maldives 2015.

5. An extended internship in Emory University.
It was a productive one. Walks in Atlanta were remarkable too.

6. ICWS 2016 in San Francisco. 
My best conference experience so far!

7. Berlin, presenting 3 papers at IC2E 2016. 
Berlin has become my most favourite city that I havent lived in yet! My first (and only, so far) doctoral symposium too.

8. CoopIS 2016 in Rhodes
A beautiful Greek island. It was still sunny and pleasant in the autumn.

9. A long walk all over the historic village of Kostrzyn/K�strin in Poland.
Crossing the border of German and Poland!

10. Relaxing weekend in Viseu
A romantic town in Portugal, set in the Christmas mood.

11. The multicultural New York City!

Daily and nightly walks and restaurant crawls.

12. Winning a new laptop.
Feeling lucky! 

13. AMIA-CRI 2016 San Francisco
A podium abstract presentation and a poster presentation. My first poster, and also first time in a medical conference.

14. EMJD-DC Spring Event in Costa da Caparica.
Visiting from Atlanta! A long travel.

15. Finishing touches of Atlanta.
First time selling stuff, and donating things in bulk.

16. Foggy Vaduz castle.

 Liechtenstein is a cute little country!

17. A walk in the wildness, Feldkirch, Austria.

An early morning train ride and walk.

18. Snowy white trees of Uetliberg, Switzerland.

Cold, but pleasant.

19. Return to Lisboa
An intermediate era waiting for my move to Belgium early next year.

20. Cooking innovations
Thanks to the YDFM (Your Dekalb Farmers Market), which offered variety of food products and vegetables at a cheap price, from all over the world.

21. Birthday in the sky.
Not sure where exactly that was. Possibly in the skies of Russia. Since I was flying eastwards, the 00:00 must have shrunk somewhere in the timezone changes.

22. Chinese new year in Shenzhen, China.

Second time to Shenzhen and also my second visit to Splendid China. Good memories.

23. Canon EOS M2.
Taking it everywhere I travel. :)

24. Naming the projects and papers.
It is fun, always.

25. Being a mentor again in GSoC, after 3 years.

26. Applying for visas, after a long time!
To the US and Belgium. Not that I am a fan of visa applications.

27. Olaias metro station.
This is one of the most beautiful metro stations of Europe. This becomes our daily stop the last 3 months.

28. Feeling the heat of being a "senior PhD student".
I am in the middle of the third year. Means, 5 semesters gone. Only 3 remaining. Not a new student anymore.

29. Attending a number of conferences to present my papers.
Last year, I missed many due to clashes in schedules and visa issues. This year was better in that aspect.

30. Looking at the future
Awaiting an "intermediate year of 2017" with more migrations of PhD mobility, and a "final year of 2018", to graduate!

Thanks for reading my list till the end. If you are really interested, you may also read the blog posts on the previous years (2016 - 2012) as well. Happy new year everyone. Hope 2017 will be more positive and bring us more happy news than 2016. I am also reaching the 30s in 2017. This makes 2016 my last complete year in 20s. Feeling old. :D

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Now Dont Go Breaking My Heart

Dear friends,

** This is a review I did a long time ago, on the 28th of January 2011, and published in my previous blog "Paint The Sky". But as you did not read this before, I thought I may share my thoughts with you. Pay attention to spoilers, as I shall be telling you about Ella Enchanted **

… I won’t go breaking your heart! :)
If you want an easy and fun movie to watch on a Saturday/Sunday – or any moment and day in which you would be free ;)) – than I would sincerely recommend “Ella Enchanted” – the movie from 2004, with Anne Hathaway.
I know… I know… I am writing about another Cinderella story :) but trust me, this is a really good one: funny and somehow resembling with a musical… queer combination but most enchantingly made :) if I may say so myself :p

 ***

Based on Gail Carson Levine’s award winning novel, this is the story of Ella, a young woman who was given a “gift” of obedience by a fairy named Lucinda. Anything anyone tells her to do, she must obey. When her mother passes away, Ella is cared for by her thoughtless and greedy father who remarries a loathsome woman with two treacherous daughters. This modern-day, fantasy Cinderella features fairies, ogres and elves…as well as a hero in the guise of Prince Charmont, whom Ella falls in love with. Unlike Cinderella though, Ella must depend on herself and her intelligence to get her through her troubles and find Lucinda in order for her “curse” to be broken! Written by M. C. Gomez

Being a love story and a story for children differently told attracted me very much, but when all the modernist bits and pieces came tumbling in I was starting to reconsider… what made me love the movie was the scene in the middle of the movie, when Ella and Prince Charmont are at a giants wedding. Why? It is simple as 1-2-3 or A-B-C :) when Ella was ordered to play… and she did start playing… guess what song she did play? YES! A Queen song, and indeed one of my favs: “Somebody to love“… and to a great wonder, Anne played it quite nicely!!! :) To the same wedding I had another shock: one of the giants was portrait by Heidi Klum – that also sings at the end of the movie a bit :) I find her presence in this movie as a giant female quite refreshing and idea tumbling, as everyone states giants are awful :)

Another of my fav scenes is portrait in the still above: the moment where love conquers all and Ella disobeys her final command – not killing thus the prince – and breaks the spell of her “gift of obedience”.
The Hall of Mirrors somehow remembers me of the story of Snow White and the room her stepmother had… the room for The Mirror…

A great and beautiful and appreciated surprise was Cary Elwes, as Edgar – the princes tutor and “good” uncle – and Minnie Driver, as Mandy – Ella’s house fairy :) Their appearance on the screen is always mostly refreshing and makes one smile, no matter what.
Of course you will recognize Edgar as the wonderfully dashing Robin Hood from the epic movie “Robin Hood – Man in Tights“. Here, Cary Elwes plays the bad guy – although he does it very very very good I cannot help myself seeing him as Robin ;)) I must admit!!!
Minnie Driver has very short “stage entrances” but she is sparkling each time :) just remember her in “The Phantom of the Opera” if you ever watched it, and you will truly know what I am talking about ;)

The visual part of this movie is beautiful! The scenery if pleasant to the eye of the beholder and the wardrobe of each and every character suits them. The soundtrack is indeed SMASHING!!! :) and it keeps the ones who watch the movie wide awake and wanting to jiggle and move around and sing and dance like the characters on the screen :)
The finale is simply adorable, when everyone sings and dances… Now don’t go breaking my heart…
I shall have to think more over the acting that Mr. Hugh Dancy presents us… he is a British actor that promises much :) The first time I had seen him was several years ago… I do think that it was on Hallmark channel. But what I surely know is the fact that he was playing “David Copperfield”… and he played it very nicely… he would be truly fit for some more period movies :) I do have faith in him ;)

Yours truly,
A LadyBug In Love :)

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